The oil spill sucks, but do we really miss George W. Bush?
By: Amanda Anderson
It’s everywhere and it’s made every headline that you could possibly imagine. The BP Oil Spill has caused so much debate and much deserved controversy in the last month. We are all enraged with the corporation for creating the spill in the first place, but the anger has magnified since we have watched the company take their precious little time in cleaning up the disaster. As a nation, we have been shouting and protesting, asking them to plug the damn hole up to no avail. Even the boycott of BP around the country hasn’t even managed to make the company quicken up the cleaning process.
While BP has been the target of much of the projected anger, President Obama has received just as much criticism for his response to the crisis. Many people feel as if Obama didn’t have a fast enough reaction to the disaster, and they also felt the administration could have been more involved in the mishap early on.
And when the President did become involved, many felt he wasn’t angry nor did he show enough passion. During press conferences, Obama just came off way too cool about a situation that has the entire country fuming.
People even complained that they wish he had been more like George W. Bush. They wanted Obama to be more aggressive and stand on a podium declaring how he would make the executives of BP pay for their horrible mistake.
And honestly, I think it’s a tad bit ridiculous to want anyone to have any type of character traits as the former president that placed us in two wars, helped lead us to one of the most disastrous recessions this country has ever seen, and who had many questionable ties with another oil company.
I mean seriously, sure Obama could have reacted faster. But I am in no rush to ask him to be more like George W. Bush in any way, shape or form.
And one of the main reasons we voted for President Obama is because of his ability to always stay cool and level headed in a crisis. John McCain failed to do that when the stock market went berserk during the presidential campaign, and we nailed him for it while we praised Obama for his calm demeanor. Why is his coolness a problem now?
If an easily tempered and “passionate” president led us to where are now (two wars, a recession, and half-crazy), I will happily take President Obama’s cool demeanor any day. Besides…coolness rarely leads countries into wars.